This is a point in the history of the American labor movement, and of labor movements throughout the world, when realities are changing rapidly – even cataclysmically. It has been said of such times that:

At present, events have indeed leapt ahead of ideas regarding the labor movement. For labor to cope with new and powerful economic and social forces, it is necessary for its ideas to catch up. It is important that this happen, given that the labor movement is at the very heart of American democracy.

This book is an attempt to facilitate the American labor movement's catchup by identifying and analyzing ideas that offer some hope for it. As there is nothing new under the sun, almost none of the ideas put forward here are original in the sense that no one has ever thought of them before. Instead, they consist of a revival of old ideas, new combinations of ideas, changed emphases, and a restructuring of the ways that strategies are put together. Also, there is an attempt to figure out what is central to a labor movement and to suggest a new structure for it.